jruegg wrote:Ok. I can understand what you and Thunk mean here. However, though the Grace doesn’t change regardless of how vile the person offering it on behalf of God, it does make it incredibly difficult for people to receive that grace when they know what that person has done. I think the term is 'Hypocrites' ...... I’m sure I read something in scripture about them. (Matthew 23)

Perhaps it is the church’s responsibility, then, to remove these obstacles to grace (and defrock them), for the sake of the flock.

yes... this is why the sin of scandal is so grave.

Do we all understand what scandal is?

CCC wrote:2284 Scandal is an attitude or behavior which leads another to do evil. The person who gives scandal becomes his neighbor's tempter. He damages virtue and integrity; he may even draw his brother into spiritual death. Scandal is a grave offense if by deed or omission another is deliberately led into a grave offense.

2285 Scandal takes on a particular gravity by reason of the authority of those who cause it or the weakness of those who are scandalized. It prompted our Lord to utter this curse: "Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a great millstone fastened round his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea."86 Scandal is grave when given by those who by nature or office are obliged to teach and educate others. Jesus reproaches the scribes and Pharisees on this account: he likens them to wolves in sheep's clothing.87

The "scandal" is a widespread temptation to leave the Church and abandon one's faith. "Hey... if those priests and bishops can't keep their gropy hands off of the teenager boys, then why should anyone struggle against our desires to fornication or contraception? Why bother with religion at all, if the pastors don't seem to care?"

Of course, there are thousands of good and holy priests who are trying to pastor well, but the grievously bad example of the few overwhelms the good example of the many.

How many of those young ones turned away from GOD because of such priests? How many, as adults, raised their kids to ignore as evil those claiming GOD's grace because of such priests? Millstone - neck - sea probably would be a better consequence for such priests.

Aye. Happiness has been achieved. I can now love you all because I'll never know what you actually think. --- Hugodrax, 16 July 2016

He is another Christ – respect him
He is God’s representative – trust him
He is your benefactor – be thankful to him

At the Altar
He offers your prayer to God – do not forget him
He prays for you and yours in Purgatory – ask God’s mercy for him

In the Confessional
He is the physician of your soul – show him its wounds
He directs you towards God – follow his admonitions
He is judging – abide by his decision

In his Daily Life
He is human – do not hastily condemn him
He is human – a word of kindness will cheer him
If you must tell his faults – tell them to God
that He may give him light and strength to correct them
He has a great responsibility – ask God to guide him in life
and to be merciful to him in death

"For this reason, on June 1, 1951 … we did speak of the right of people to migrate, which right is founded in the very nature of land."— Pope Pius XII, Exsul Familia Nazarethana

He is another Christ – respect him
He is God’s representative – trust him
He is your benefactor – be thankful to him

At the Altar
He offers your prayer to God – do not forget him
He prays for you and yours in Purgatory – ask God’s mercy for him

In the Confessional
He is the physician of your soul – show him its wounds
He directs you towards God – follow his admonitions
He is judging – abide by his decision

In his Daily Life
He is human – do not hastily condemn him
He is human – a word of kindness will cheer him
If you must tell his faults – tell them to God
that He may give him light and strength to correct them
He has a great responsibility – ask God to guide him in life
and to be merciful to him in death

And if he fails and falls-- remove him from position (officiating authority) to deal with church discipline correctly and honestly to protect the church and the congregations who are trusting in God.

Out of control odd rare old man (or possibly an hobbyist). -- Label by The Big R.
The 6s of 1st John:
2:6 Whoever claims to live in him must walk as Jesus walked
3:6 No one who lives in him keeps on sinning

Here'ss my rub, and its not just with the RCC because it happens elsewhere. It's not just with particalar persons, its with whole religious institions.

If your going to be pro life, be pro life from the cradle to the grave, not just in the womb.

Is life any more precious in the womb than it is out side the womb?

Is the victimization of babies in the womb and the would be mothers somehow more serious than the victimization of the 8 year old boy outside the womb? Or the victimization of the cloistered nun who is raped and beaten and forced to abort the life within her womb?

You see there's church institutions who proudly proclaim "We are Pro Life" and with great fervor they call for compassion and prayers for the victims inside the womb and the mothers and families.

And with great fervor they rightly seek to oust the pro choice politicians, put planned parenthood out of business and condemn the doctors as murderers, even cnvict them all as criminals.

But when it comes to life outside the womb, as in young boys and nuns and pastors wives?

The same fervor is lacking in ousting the molesting and the raping church leaders, holding them responsible and seeking criminal charges. Instead they deflect and divert and mollycoddle the perpetrators who abuse life outside the womb. After all they ARE men of God, Priest, pastors. We need to pray for them. "oh yes we should also pray for the victims of those sins."

ANd what it really sounds like is akin to what Rusty said. The greater concern is for the church and its image.

Choke. Gag.

And I can't speak for Onyx, but I know what I would like to see...is justice for the boys and the nuns and the preachers wives and for the criminals, even if it smears the integrity of the church, because justice is the first step to healing and repentance is the first step towards reconcilation....entire churches and entire nations to God.

Last edited by dasmokeryaget on Sun Nov 18, 2012 6:01 pm, edited 1 time in total.

dasmokeryaget wrote:Here'ss my rub, and its not just with the RCC because it happens elsewhere. It's not just with particalar persons, its with whole religious institions.

If your going to be pro life, be pro life from the cradle to the grave, not just in the womb.

Is life any more precious in the womb than it is out side the womb?

Is the victimization of babies in the womb and the would be mothers somehow more serious than the victimization of the 8 year old boy outside the womb? Or the victimization of the cloistered nun who is raped and beaten and forced to abort the life within her womb?

You see there's church institutions who proudly proclaim "We are Pro Life" and with great fervor they call for compassion and prayers for the victims inside the womb and the mothers and families.

And with great fervor they rightly seek to oust the pro choice politicians, put planned parenthood out of business and condemn the doctors as murderers, even cnvict them all as criminals.

But when it comes to life outside the womb, as in young boys and nuns and pastors wives?

The same fervor is lacking in ousting the molesting and the raping church leaders, holding them responsible and seeking criminal charges. Instead they deflect and divert and mollycoddle the perpetrators who abuse life outside the womb. After all they ARE men of God, Priest, pastors. We need to pray for them. "oh yes we should also pray for the victims of those sins."

ANd what it really sounds like is akin to what Rusty said. The greater concern is for the church and its image.

Choke. Gag.

And I can't speak for Onyx, but I know what I would like to see...is justice for the boys and the nuns and the preachers wives and for the criminals, even if it smears the integrity of the church, because justice is the first step to healing and repentance is the first step towards reconcilation....entire churches and entire nations to God.

It IS important to protect the image of a church because a church is spotless and without blemish (assuming that the RCC is truly a Church). Her people may not be, but the church is. Unfortunately, reporters, pundits and even rank and file Christians cannot understand that, but instead conflate the sin, the institution, the church and the various other truths pertaining to it. This leads them into a state of confusion about what the church and Her sinners are about and why we need a spotless church to begin with.

“Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering.” -Yoda

“I grew up in a church with Ned Flanders. Down to the mustache. But so did a bunch of people I assume, which makes it so fun-diddly-unny.” -tuttle

dasmokeryaget wrote:Here'ss my rub, and its not just with the RCC because it happens elsewhere. It's not just with particalar persons, its with whole religious institions.

If your going to be pro life, be pro life from the cradle to the grave, not just in the womb.

Is life any more precious in the womb than it is out side the womb?

Is the victimization of babies in the womb and the would be mothers somehow more serious than the victimization of the 8 year old boy outside the womb? Or the victimization of the cloistered nun who is raped and beaten and forced to abort the life within her womb?

You see there's church institutions who proudly proclaim "We are Pro Life" and with great fervor they call for compassion and prayers for the victims inside the womb and the mothers and families.

And with great fervor they rightly seek to oust the pro choice politicians, put planned parenthood out of business and condemn the doctors as murderers, even cnvict them all as criminals.

But when it comes to life outside the womb, as in young boys and nuns and pastors wives?

The same fervor is lacking in ousting the molesting and the raping church leaders, holding them responsible and seeking criminal charges. Instead they deflect and divert and mollycoddle the perpetrators who abuse life outside the womb. After all they ARE men of God, Priest, pastors. We need to pray for them. "oh yes we should also pray for the victims of those sins."

ANd what it really sounds like is akin to what Rusty said. The greater concern is for the church and its image.

Choke. Gag.

And I can't speak for Onyx, but I know what I would like to see...is justice for the boys and the nuns and the preachers wives and for the criminals, even if it smears the integrity of the church, because justice is the first step to healing and repentance is the first step towards reconcilation....entire churches and entire nations to God.

It IS important to protect the image of a church because a church is spotless and without blemish (assuming that the RCC is truly a Church). Her people may not be, but the church is. Unfortunately, reporters, pundits and even rank and file Christians cannot understand that, but instead conflate the sin, the institution, the church and the various other truths pertaining to it. This leads them into a state of confusion about what the church and Her sinners are about and why we need a spotless church to begin with.

But this doesn't me the church should cover sin to protect her image should it?

Would it not be better for The Church to vigorously work to uncover sin within the body, to admonish it, and faithfully work to restore transgressors?

dasmokeryaget wrote:Here'ss my rub, and its not just with the RCC because it happens elsewhere. It's not just with particalar persons, its with whole religious institions.

If your going to be pro life, be pro life from the cradle to the grave, not just in the womb.

Is life any more precious in the womb than it is out side the womb?

Is the victimization of babies in the womb and the would be mothers somehow more serious than the victimization of the 8 year old boy outside the womb? Or the victimization of the cloistered nun who is raped and beaten and forced to abort the life within her womb?

You see there's church institutions who proudly proclaim "We are Pro Life" and with great fervor they call for compassion and prayers for the victims inside the womb and the mothers and families.

And with great fervor they rightly seek to oust the pro choice politicians, put planned parenthood out of business and condemn the doctors as murderers, even cnvict them all as criminals.

But when it comes to life outside the womb, as in young boys and nuns and pastors wives?

The same fervor is lacking in ousting the molesting and the raping church leaders, holding them responsible and seeking criminal charges. Instead they deflect and divert and mollycoddle the perpetrators who abuse life outside the womb. After all they ARE men of God, Priest, pastors. We need to pray for them. "oh yes we should also pray for the victims of those sins."

ANd what it really sounds like is akin to what Rusty said. The greater concern is for the church and its image.

Choke. Gag.

And I can't speak for Onyx, but I know what I would like to see...is justice for the boys and the nuns and the preachers wives and for the criminals, even if it smears the integrity of the church, because justice is the first step to healing and repentance is the first step towards reconcilation....entire churches and entire nations to God.

It IS important to protect the image of a church because a church is spotless and without blemish (assuming that the RCC is truly a Church). Her people may not be, but the church is. Unfortunately, reporters, pundits and even rank and file Christians cannot understand that, but instead conflate the sin, the institution, the church and the various other truths pertaining to it. This leads them into a state of confusion about what the church and Her sinners are about and why we need a spotless church to begin with.

But this doesn't me the church should cover sin to protect her image should it?

Would it not be better for The Church to vigorously work to uncover sin within the body, to admonish it, and faithfully work to restore transgressors?

We all need to work vigorously to uncover our sins and bring them to the light! Sinners do tarnish the image of the Church and sinners should be taking this very seriously. The world doesn't understand but Christians should and Christians should be working toward imparting this knowledge to the world.

We can beat a dead horse all day long. I don't believe the RCC as a whole is interested in covering up these sins for the purpose of protecting the image of these people. Clearly the problems in Australia and other places has proven that there's a problem with some bishops/priests.

“Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering.” -Yoda

“I grew up in a church with Ned Flanders. Down to the mustache. But so did a bunch of people I assume, which makes it so fun-diddly-unny.” -tuttle

dasmokeryaget wrote:Here'ss my rub, and its not just with the RCC because it happens elsewhere. It's not just with particalar persons, its with whole religious institions.

If your going to be pro life, be pro life from the cradle to the grave, not just in the womb.

Is life any more precious in the womb than it is out side the womb?

Is the victimization of babies in the womb and the would be mothers somehow more serious than the victimization of the 8 year old boy outside the womb? Or the victimization of the cloistered nun who is raped and beaten and forced to abort the life within her womb?

You see there's church institutions who proudly proclaim "We are Pro Life" and with great fervor they call for compassion and prayers for the victims inside the womb and the mothers and families.

And with great fervor they rightly seek to oust the pro choice politicians, put planned parenthood out of business and condemn the doctors as murderers, even cnvict them all as criminals.

But when it comes to life outside the womb, as in young boys and nuns and pastors wives?

The same fervor is lacking in ousting the molesting and the raping church leaders, holding them responsible and seeking criminal charges. Instead they deflect and divert and mollycoddle the perpetrators who abuse life outside the womb. After all they ARE men of God, Priest, pastors. We need to pray for them. "oh yes we should also pray for the victims of those sins."

ANd what it really sounds like is akin to what Rusty said. The greater concern is for the church and its image.

Choke. Gag.

And I can't speak for Onyx, but I know what I would like to see...is justice for the boys and the nuns and the preachers wives and for the criminals, even if it smears the integrity of the church, because justice is the first step to healing and repentance is the first step towards reconcilation....entire churches and entire nations to God.

It IS important to protect the image of a church because a church is spotless and without blemish (assuming that the RCC is truly a Church). Her people may not be, but the church is. Unfortunately, reporters, pundits and even rank and file Christians cannot understand that, but instead conflate the sin, the institution, the church and the various other truths pertaining to it. This leads them into a state of confusion about what the church and Her sinners are about and why we need a spotless church to begin with.

Only Jesus Christ can present the image of the church as spotless and without blemish to the father ONLY and it is ONLY through his shed blood for the church. No other way can the church be presented as spotless and without blemish.

When the church presents ITSELF as spotless and without blemish to the unbelieving world, as in "One true religion" and as "Christ on the earth" it puts itself under a microscope and paints a huge target on its back for every unbelieving naysayer, pundit, media etc to take potshots at.

On the one hand the church presents the priest who is the "Vicar of Christ" or Christ in the world, and on the other hand you end up with "Vicars of Christ" who are child molesters and rapists.
YOu can thave it both ways.

What does that do to Christ? His testimony and to the rest of christendom?

What should the pundits do? expect the world to believe that its OK to be the Vicar of Christ and a molester too?

Which is exactly what is being conveyed when the offending priest are not immediately removed from preisthood.

The lesson learned with Jimmy Swaggart, Benny Hinn and a whole host of others was this. Either deal swiftly, openly and forcefully with the sin on an internal basis, "in house" and be forthcoming about it..... or allow the media and the world to deal with it when it gets exposed by them (And they WILL expose it)

the consequences of the latter option being far more damaging and damning for the church and the testimony of Christ

The church is upside down. Way too many good people giving way too much respect to way too many frauds.

You guys don't need to convince me that there is such a thing as a spotless church. You need to storm into the Vatican. Turf out every one of the current management. They've had their chance and they cocked it up. Hang all the silly costumes in glass cabinets for tourists to take photos. Take back all the money. Give it to the people who are actually running your hospitals and soup kitchens. Or to put it another way - *WWJD?

Onyx wrote:The church is upside down. Way too many good people giving way too much respect to way too many frauds.

You guys don't need to convince me that there is such a thing as a spotless church. You need to storm into the Vatican. Turf out every one of the current management. They've had their chance and they cocked it up. Hang all the silly costumes in glass cabinets for tourists to take photos. Take back all the money. Give it to the people who are actually running your hospitals and soup kitchens. Or to put it another way - *WWJD?

*Not a phrase I thought I'd catch myself using.

And then what? Hope that congregations can come to a consensus on the Truth of God and maintain it spotlessly without central leadership? It seems I've heard that something like that has been tried before...

Don't confuse the sins of some with the sins of all. How many of the 1.2 billion Catholics in the world are complicit with the abuse and the coverup? A few hundred scattered across the entire globe? What has the Vatican done to address these concerns thus far? How many of these abuses are still happening? How many of those in the Vatican are completely innocent and/or have been helping to right these wrongs?

dasmokeryaget wrote:Here'ss my rub, and its not just with the RCC because it happens elsewhere. It's not just with particalar persons, its with whole religious institions.

If your going to be pro life, be pro life from the cradle to the grave, not just in the womb.

Is life any more precious in the womb than it is out side the womb?

Is the victimization of babies in the womb and the would be mothers somehow more serious than the victimization of the 8 year old boy outside the womb? Or the victimization of the cloistered nun who is raped and beaten and forced to abort the life within her womb?

You see there's church institutions who proudly proclaim "We are Pro Life" and with great fervor they call for compassion and prayers for the victims inside the womb and the mothers and families.

And with great fervor they rightly seek to oust the pro choice politicians, put planned parenthood out of business and condemn the doctors as murderers, even cnvict them all as criminals.

But when it comes to life outside the womb, as in young boys and nuns and pastors wives?

The same fervor is lacking in ousting the molesting and the raping church leaders, holding them responsible and seeking criminal charges. Instead they deflect and divert and mollycoddle the perpetrators who abuse life outside the womb. After all they ARE men of God, Priest, pastors. We need to pray for them. "oh yes we should also pray for the victims of those sins."

ANd what it really sounds like is akin to what Rusty said. The greater concern is for the church and its image.

Choke. Gag.

And I can't speak for Onyx, but I know what I would like to see...is justice for the boys and the nuns and the preachers wives and for the criminals, even if it smears the integrity of the church, because justice is the first step to healing and repentance is the first step towards reconcilation....entire churches and entire nations to God.

It IS important to protect the image of a church because a church is spotless and without blemish (assuming that the RCC is truly a Church). Her people may not be, but the church is. Unfortunately, reporters, pundits and even rank and file Christians cannot understand that, but instead conflate the sin, the institution, the church and the various other truths pertaining to it. This leads them into a state of confusion about what the church and Her sinners are about and why we need a spotless church to begin with.

Only Jesus Christ can present the image of the church as spotless and without blemish to the father ONLY and it is ONLY through his shed blood for the church. No other way can the church be presented as spotless and without blemish.

When the church presents ITSELF as spotless and without blemish to the unbelieving world, as in "One true religion" and as "Christ on the earth" it puts itself under a microscope and paints a huge target on its back for every unbelieving naysayer, pundit, media etc to take potshots at.

If Christ can boldly present the Church to the Father then surely the faithful can boldly declare what Christ has done for the church. It matters not what the world thinks. There is no need to hide the truth of that. It is a thing of beauty and a sign of God's great mercy and grace. In like manner it's also important for sinners to expose themselves to the light so that their deeds can be exposed. In this way God may save them.

On the one hand the church presents the priest who is the "Vicar of Christ" or Christ in the world, and on the other hand you end up with "Vicars of Christ" who are child molesters and rapists.
YOu can thave it both ways.

What does that do to Christ? His testimony and to the rest of christendom?

What should the pundits do? expect the world to believe that its OK to be the Vicar of Christ and a molester too?

Which is exactly what is being conveyed when the offending priest are not immediately removed from preisthood.

The lesson learned with Jimmy Swaggart, Benny Hinn and a whole host of others was this. Either deal swiftly, openly and forcefully with the sin on an internal basis, "in house" and be forthcoming about it..... or allow the media and the world to deal with it when it gets exposed by them (And they WILL expose it)

the consequences of the latter option being far more damaging and damning for the church and the testimony of Christ

My intent was to simply care for humanity of millions of faithful Catholics to include the many faithful chaste clergy who have willingly sacrificed of themselves for God's service. The world will try to demonize the "institution" of the Catholic Church and paint everyone in them with a broad brush. If those in the Catholic "institution" down in Australia and the Catholic "institutions" who will be charged with helping the churches in Australia work through this try to cover up these sins in order to hide their own sins than I would hope they would avoid grand statements about the glory of their churches because it's just hypocritical for them to say that. However, if they take care to concern themselves for those hurt in these sins and really try to weed out the evil doers then we shouldn't be offended if they avoid the ruthless and endless attacks from those people who desire to attack the very essence of those churches itself. In other words, I hope they find the courage to confront the problems without allowing the enemies of the churches to take more than what is right.

I would personally hate to be the one to walk that tight rope by making those PR calls. For some, they will never be satisfied with any sort of justice. They will only be happy to take every hard earned penny every saint in Australia gave to their parish whether they and their priest has anything to do with these evils or not. No amount of crawling on the knees will satisfy some. But we also know that no amount of money or jail time can truly take back the evil done to those victims. At some point, forgiveness needs to be extended by those who were hurt.

Many want to see the end of all clergy because of the abuses of some of them. That's not fair. God gave the churches bishops because we need them. The Catholic church is huge and these sins committed have deep roots. Unfortunately, it may take a long time to weed them all out. That's just a fact of life.

At any rate, I will leave this thread at that. To me there's little sense in going on too much about it. I just hoped to point out other angles to the problem that aren't commonly considered by the media set.

“Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering.” -Yoda

“I grew up in a church with Ned Flanders. Down to the mustache. But so did a bunch of people I assume, which makes it so fun-diddly-unny.” -tuttle

Onyx wrote:The church is upside down. Way too many good people giving way too much respect to way too many frauds.

You guys don't need to convince me that there is such a thing as a spotless church. You need to storm into the Vatican. Turf out every one of the current management. They've had their chance and they cocked it up. Hang all the silly costumes in glass cabinets for tourists to take photos. Take back all the money. Give it to the people who are actually running your hospitals and soup kitchens. Or to put it another way - *WWJD?

*Not a phrase I thought I'd catch myself using.

And then what? Hope that congregations can come to a consensus on the Truth of God and maintain it spotlessly without central leadership? It seems I've heard that something like that has been tried before...

Don't confuse the sins of some with the sins of all. How many of the 1.2 billion Catholics in the world are complicit with the abuse and the coverup? A few hundred scattered across the entire globe? What has the Vatican done to address these concerns thus far? How many of these abuses are still happening? How many of those in the Vatican are completely innocent and/or have been helping to right these wrongs?

My semi-tongue-in-cheek suggestion about the Vatican stems from my belief that good people will do good things, and that good and humble people generally give far too much credit to their authority figures (who are all to often less inspiring individuals than they themselves).

Actually, I don't think you should storm the Vatican. (Although it might be a fun Monty Python moment.) My solution is more pragmatic. You should stop sending them money. You should stop paying their legal defence teams. You should stop buying them new dresses. You should stop confessing your sins to them (until your sins amount to a fraction of theirs!)

In essence, I think that you should stop doing everything on Wosbald's little ready-reference for keeping exploitative abusers free of scrutiny...

wosbald wrote:+JMJ+

THE PRIEST

He is another Christ – respect him
He is God’s representative – trust him
He is your benefactor – be thankful to him

At the Altar
He offers your prayer to God – do not forget him
He prays for you and yours in Purgatory – ask God’s mercy for him

In the Confessional
He is the physician of your soul – show him its wounds
He directs you towards God – follow his admonitions
He is judging – abide by his decision

In his Daily Life
He is human – do not hastily condemn him
He is human – a word of kindness will cheer him
If you must tell his faults – tell them to God
that He may give him light and strength to correct them
He has a great responsibility – ask God to guide him in life
and to be merciful to him in death

The argument that only a small minority are offenders makes me gasp. It's the same as the Muslim argument that only a small percentage are suicide bombers. Well... I don't know the exact percentage, but thousands of offences in about every country, every decade, every order, every region, multiple victims often multiple offenders within the same institution, consistent patterns of denial, blaming the victims, shuffling the offenders around to new groups of children. The numbers so far revealed are catastrophic. And nobody sensible is suggesting that we've yet discovered anywhere near the total numbers of offences that have and are occurring.

And for all that, this royal commission is not about the offences. It's about the cover-ups. This is not a "tarnished image" of the church as someone called it. This is about the culture of the church, the authority structures, the lines of communication, the controls of information, the influences, the responses to crises, the handling of dissent, the learned subservience, the learned leadership style, the schools which instil and transfer modes of behaviour. In other words, it's not a few bad apples, it's the nature of the institution itself which has produced this.

You can't clean it out. And here's why. At its very essence the religion demands that people accept their faith on apostolic authority. As Wosbald rightly reminds us, you have to trust the priest, otherwise the whole thing falls apart. And all the praying for the priests in the past didn't make them clean. All the praying for the priests now isn't suddenly going to start working where it failed before. People are people. And if you think some of them are holy, you're gonna get shafted. I know there are some good thinkers, good counsellors, and good workers among them, but they mislead you when they teach that you should trust a man because of his office. The fundamental resistance to questioning authority ensures that you cannot clean it out. The most you can hope for is that church leadership is neutered. And the best hope of neutering the church leadership is withdrawing their financial support.

To answer your questions specifically...And then what? We might just amaze ourselves by discovering that we do fine without them.How many of the 1.2 billion Catholics in the world are complicit with the abuse and the coverup?Everyone who gave them money that was misused, everyone who gave them respect the didn't deserve. I know that I'm implying people have been unknowingly complicit. In fact, that's exactly what I'm saying. Good good people have been complicit because of too much humility where it was not warranted, too much loyalty where it was betrayed.A few hundred scattered across the entire globe? You clearly have not come to terms with the actual scale of this. There have been hundreds offended in single institutions! Almost no region where the Catholic Church operates has been exempt from this.How many of these abuses are still happening? We don't know because the cover-ups are still happening. That's why we're having a royal commission. But it's still an odd defence. I don't think you've been able to fathom the question of - what is wrong with an institution which allows this? This is NOT a few bad apples. This has been an integral part of the way the church has operated throughout living memory.How many of those in the Vatican are completely innocent and/or have been helping to right these wrongs? I don't know. I would guess that it is a very high number. And yet I think they're wasting their talents and good hearts.

Oh well. Thanks for asking. I guess I'd better not keep this up. It doesn't take me long to outstay my welcome these days. The reason I care so much about this particular issue is that I have lived through religious abuse. Forgive my presumption, but I think that I understand it better than your average pew sitter. I know what happens in those meetings behind closed doors when leadership are in damage-limitation mode. It is total hypocrisy, and most often, it is a total betrayal of the very motives which once inspired those men to enter the ministry.

Yes, I understand why some Catholics feel defensive. I also understand why others are standing up and saying "screw this! I'm not defending these crooks any more".

By the way TNLP, did you actually listen to the interview linked in the OP? It's about 12 minutes, but well worth it, I think.

To anyone who hopes this subject will conveniently go away... it's not me who owes that apology. This hurts, but especially so because people have not been allowed to talk about it. Now we are, and some light is being shed on the subject.

A family who has lost one daughter and had another daughter seriously damaged (now requiring 24 hour care), has spoken articulately about the calloused response they received from the Catholic Church when they reported the abuse.http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-11-23/a ... ch/4388274

They describe the Cardinal George Pell as sociopathic. This rings a bell with me, because the leader of my old cult was sociopathic (in my amateur diagnosis hind-sight kind of way).

Sociopathy (or Psychopathy) is just beginning to be understood. But it seems that individuals who lack empathy are often promoted in large organisations, because, unencumbered by empathy for others, they are able to get the job done for the organisation.

My own view is that morality is fundamentally tied to empathy. When individuals lack the human insight to recognise that others hurt or rejoice just as they do, then they struggle to integrate into their hearts foundational moral teachings such as "do unto others as you would have others do unto you." Sadly, some individuals are either weak or lacking in this empathy. So they might learn to emulate human morality, but lack a personal understanding or inclination for it.

If you hire a sociopath, I sympathise. They can be tricky. If you promote a sociopath, you have my pity, you may have been tricked again. If you elevate a sociopath to the highest office in the country, your organisation is doing it wrong.

That is a big part of why a recent survey showed that 1 in 10 Americans now identify themselves as an ex-catholic. The church leaders refuse to admit what has happened and refuse to put a stop to it. (they may say that you can think they are)

MAY THE FORCE BE WITH YOUR PIPE
What is a rebel?-A man who says No- Albert Camus